Today the county borders Cumbria to the north, Greater Manchester and Merseyside to the south, and North and West Yorkshire to the east; with a coastline on the Irish Sea to the west. The county palatine boundaries remain the same as those of the pre-1974 county, with the Duke of Lancaster exercising sovereignty rights,[6] including the appointment of lords lieutenant in Greater Manchester and Merseyside.[7]

By the census of 1971, the population of Lancashire and its county boroughs had reached 5,129,416, making it the most populous geographic county in the UK.[17] The administrative county was also the most populous of its type outside London, with a population of 2,280,359 in 1961. On 1 April 1974, under the Local Government Act 1972, the administrative county was abolished, as were the county boroughs. The urbanised southern part largely became part of two metropolitan counties, Merseyside and Greater Manchester.[18] The new county of Cumbria incorporates the Furness exclave.[4]

Lancashire contains green belt interspersed throughout the county, covering much of the southern districts and towns throughout the Ribble Valley, West Lancashire and The Fylde coastal plains to prevent convergence with the nearby Merseyside and Greater Manchester conurbations. Further pockets control the expansion of Lancaster, and surround the Blackpool urban area, as part of the western edge of the North West Green Belt. It was first drawn up from the 1950s. All the county's districts contain some portion of belt, the portion by Burnley also abutting the Forest of PendleArea of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

The Duchy of Lancaster is one of two royal duchies in England. It has landholdings throughout the region and elsewhere, operating as a property company, but also exercising the right of the Crown in the County Palatine of Lancaster.[6] While the administrative boundaries changed in the 1970s, the county palatine boundaries remain the same as the historic boundaries.[31] As a result, the High Sheriffs for Lancashire, Greater Manchester and Merseyside are appointed "within the Duchy and County Palatine of Lancaster".[32]

The High Sheriff is an ancient county officer, but is now a largely ceremonial post. High Shrievalties are the oldest secular titles under the Crown, in England and Wales. The High Sheriff is the representative of the monarch and is the "Keeper of The Queen's Peace" in the county, executing judgements of the High Court.[17]

The Duchy administers bona vacantia within the County Palatine, receiving the property of persons who die intestate and where the legal ownership cannot be ascertained. There is no separate Duke of Lancaster, the title merged into the Crown many centuries ago – but the Duchy is administered by the Queen in Right of the Duchy of Lancaster. A separate court system for the county palatine was abolished by Courts Act 1971. A particular form of The Loyal Toast, 'The Queen, Duke of Lancaster' is in regular use in the county palatine. Lancaster serves as the county town of the county palatine.

Lancashire in the 19th century was a major centre of economic activity, and hence of wealth. Activities included coal mining, textile production, particularly cotton, and fishing. Preston Docks, an industrial port are now disused for commercial purposes. Lancashire was historically the location of the port of Liverpool while Barrow-in-Furness is famous for shipbuilding.

The creation of Lancashire Enterprise Zone was announced in 2011. It was launched in April 2012, based at the airfields owned by BAE Systems in Warton and Samlesbury.[34]Warton Aerodrome covers 72 hectares (180 acres) and Samlesbury Aerodrome is 74 hectares.[35] Development is coordinated by Lancashire Enterprise Partnership, Lancashire County Council and BAE Systems.[34] The first businesses to move into the zone did so in March 2015, at Warton.[36]

This is a chart of trend of regional gross value added of the non-metropolitan county of Lancashire at basic prices published by the Office for National Statistics with figures in millions of British pounds sterling.[39]

Lancashire has a mostly comprehensive system with four state grammar schools. Not including sixth form colleges, there are 77 state schools (not including Burnley's new schools) and 24 independent schools. The Clitheroe area has secondary modern schools. Sixth form provision is limited at most schools in most districts, with only Fylde and Lancaster districts having mostly sixth forms at schools. The rest depend on FE colleges and sixth form colleges, where they exist. South Ribble has the largest school population and Fylde the smallest (only three schools). Burnley's schools have had a new broom and have essentially been knocked down and started again in 2006. There are many Church of England and Catholic faith schools in Lancashire.

The Lancashire economy relies strongly on the M6 motorway which runs from north to south, past Lancaster and Preston. The M55 connects Preston to Blackpool and is 11.5 miles (18.3 km) long. The M65 motorway from Colne, connects Burnley, Accrington, Blackburn to Preston. The M61 from Preston via Chorley and the M66 starting 500 metres (0.3 mi) inside the county boundary near Edenfield, provide links between Lancashire and Manchester] and the trans-Pennine M62. The M58 crosses the southernmost part of the county from the M6 near Wigan to Liverpool via Skelmersdale.

The major settlements in the ceremonial county are concentrated on the Fylde coast (the Blackpool Urban Area), and a belt of towns running west-east along the M65: Preston, Blackburn, Accrington, Burnley, Nelson and Colne. South of Preston are the towns of Leyland and Chorley; the three formed part of the Central Lancashire New Town designated in 1970. The north of the county is predominantly rural and sparsely populated, except for the towns of Lancaster and Morecambe which form a large conurbation of almost 100,000 people. Lancashire is home to a significant Asian population, numbering over 70,000 and 6% of the county's population, and concentrated largely in the former cotton mill towns in the south east.

The table below has divided the settlements into their local authority district. Each district has a centre of administration; for some of these correlate with a district's largest town, while others are named after the geographical area.

Lancashire has a long and highly productive tradition of music making. In the early modern era the county shared in the national tradition of balladry, including perhaps the finest border ballad, "The Ballad of Chevy Chase", thought to have been composed by the Lancashire-born minstrel Richard Sheale.[52] The county was also a common location for folk songs, including "The Lancashire Miller", "Warrington Ale" and "The soldier's farewell to Manchester", while Liverpool, as a major seaport, was the subject of many sea shanties, including "The Leaving of Liverpool" and "Maggie May",[53] beside several local Wassailing songs.[52] In the Industrial Revolution changing social and economic patterns helped create new traditions and styles of folk song, often linked to migration and patterns of work.[54] These included processional dances, often associated with rushbearing or the Wakes Week festivities, and types of step dance, most famously clog dancing.[54][55]

Lancashire had a lively culture of choral and classical music, with very large numbers of local church choirs from the 17th century,[62] leading to the foundation of local choral societies from the mid-18th century, often particularly focused on performances of the music of Handel and his contemporaries.[63] It also played a major part in the development of brass bands which emerged in the county, particularly in the textile and coalfield areas, in the 19th century.[64] The first open competition for brass bands was held at Manchester in 1853, and continued annually until the 1980s.[65] The vibrant brass band culture of the area made an important contribution to the foundation and staffing of the Hallé Orchestra from 1857, the oldest extant professional orchestra in the United Kingdom.[66] The same local musical tradition produced eminent figures such as Sir William Walton (1902–88), son of an Oldham choirmaster and music teacher,[67] Sir Thomas Beecham (1879–1961), born in St. Helens, who began his career by conducting local orchestras[68] and Alan Rawsthorne (1905–71) born in Haslingden.[69] The conductor David Atherton, co-founder of the London Sinfonietta, was born in Blackpool in 1944.[70] Lancashire also produced more populist figures, such as early musical theatre composer Leslie Stuart (1863–1928), born in Southport, who began his musical career as organist of Salford Cathedral.[71]

The Beatles in 1964. The band, arguably the most commercially successful act of the rock music era, began its career in and around Liverpool.

Liverpool produced a number of nationally and internationally successful popular singers in the 1950s, including traditional pop stars Frankie Vaughan and Lita Roza, and one of the most successful British rock and roll stars in Billy Fury.[58] Many Lancashire towns had vibrant skiffle scenes in the late 1950s, out of which by the early 1960s a flourishing culture of beat groups began to emerge, particularly around Liverpool and Manchester. It has been estimated that there were around 350 bands active in and around Liverpool in this era, often playing ballrooms, concert halls and clubs, among them the Beatles.[81] After their national success from 1962, a number of Liverpool performers were able to follow them into the charts, including Gerry & the Pacemakers, the Searchers and Cilla Black. The first act to break through in the UK who were not from Liverpool, or managed by Brian Epstein, were Freddie and the Dreamers, who were based in Manchester,[82] as were Herman's Hermits and the Hollies.[83] Led by the Beatles, beat groups from the region spearheaded the British Invasion of the US, which made a major contribution to the development of rock music.[84] After the decline of beat groups in the late 1960s the centre of rock culture shifted to London and there were relatively few local bands who achieved national prominence until the growth of a disco funk scene and the punk rock revolution in the mid and late 1970s.[85]

Whistle Down the Wind, 1961, was directed by Bryan Forbes, set at the foot of Worsaw Hill and in Burnley, and starred local Lancashire schoolchildren.

The tunnel scene was shot on the old Bacup-Rochdale railway line, location 53°41'29.65"N, 2°11'25.18"W, off the A6066 (New Line) where the line passes beneath Stack Lane. The tunnel is still there, in use as an industrial unit but the railway has long since been removed.

^Harris and Thacker (1987). write on page 252: Certainly there were links between Cheshire and south Lancashire before 1000, when Wulfric Spot held lands in both territories. Wulfric's estates remained grouped together after his death, when they were left to his brother Aelfhelm. And indeed, there still seems to have been some kind of connexion in 1086, when south Lancashire was surveyed together with Cheshire by the Domesday commissioners. Nevertheless, the two territories do seem to have been distinguished from one another in some way and it is not certain that the shire-moot and the reeves referred to in the south Lancashire section of Domesday were the Cheshire ones.

^Crosby, A. (1996). writes on page 31: The Domesday Survey (1086) included south Lancashire with Cheshire for convenience, but the Mersey, the name of which means 'boundary river' is known to have divided the kingdoms of Northumbria and Mercia and there is no doubt that this was the real boundary.